I was fine, I said, as I do on every visitation board – adding that my only complaint was that I was imprisoned for my political views in the first place. My conditions are correct. I know they must surely be better than what my grandfather went through when he was arrested on “anti-Soviet” charges in 1937 before being sent to the gulag. He survived this (and went on to serve in World War II, earning some of the highest military decorations). I can definitely survive this.
I had a request for the ombudsman, however. On September 11, Moscow will hold municipal elections for some 1,400 district council seats across the city. Until I am sentenced, I continue to enjoy my right to vote. The prison where I am being held is only a 40-minute drive from my home and my polling station in downtown Moscow — so I said I wanted to exercise my right to vote. The mediator promised to look into the matter.
“Right to vote,” of course, is a difficult term in Vladimir Putin’s Russia. For years, our elections have been deprived of any real meaning. Politicians who have posed a real challenge to the Kremlin have been assassinated, imprisoned or driven into exile. Some opposition parties have been banned. Independent media have been shut down. And, on top of all this, the authorities have introduced a variety of electoral “reforms” that are clearly designed to allow the manipulation of results.
But even when your vote doesn’t affect the results, it’s still important to have your voice heard. Years ago, I visited the former Gestapo headquarters in Cologne, Germany, which now houses a museum of National Socialism. Among its exhibits is a ballot from one of the many plebiscites held in 1930s Germany to demonstrate universal support for the Führer. Someone had carefully put a cross next to the word “Nein” – “No”. I remember looking at that ballot and thinking that while the person using it might not have changed the course of history, they had taken a step to dismiss crimes committed with the complicity of the favorable or silent majority.
Since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February, more than 16,380 Russians have been arrested in anti-war protests across the country. More than 2,400 people have been charged with administrative offenses for denouncing the war. Dozens, including me, have been arrested under a new Criminal Code clause that penalizes public opposition to war by up to 15 years in prison. Earlier this month, a Moscow court sentenced city legislator Alexei Gorinov to seven years in prison for denouncing the war against Ukraine at his district council meeting. In the same period since the start of the war, some 150,000 people chose to simply flee Russia.
But there are many more people in this country who oppose Putin’s war on Ukraine — but who aren’t willing to risk years in prison for speaking out publicly. (The situation which I believe would be true of most societies.) And that’s why the September election is important. Residents of the capital will have the opportunity to take a stand on the situation just an hour’s flight from Moscow, where cities continue to be bombed and people continue to die every day because of Putin’s imperial ambitions. Putin’s own party, United Russia, has placed support for the war – still euphemistically referred to by state media as a “special military operation” – at the center of its municipal campaign platform. Meanwhile, so-called official opposition parties, such as the Communists or Just Russia, appear to be vying to show who can be the strongest to voice support.
The only exception is Yabloko, the veteran of the Russian Liberal Party. He managed to retain access to the ballot in Moscow and opposes Putin’s war against Ukraine. Some of its leading members, including journalist and historian Lev Shlosberg and Moscow city legislator Andrei Morev, were fined for making public statements against the war. In September, Yabloko will field candidates across Moscow, and while they won’t be able to say much because of new laws criminalizing anti-war speech, the party’s position is well known. “Our position for peace is a matter of principle,” said Maxim Kruglov, a member of the Moscow State Duma and Yabloko’s campaign coordinator. The word “peace” is still legal in Russia, at least for now.
In a few weeks, Muscovites will have a rare chance to say “no” to dictatorship and aggression, as this anonymous German did with his ballot. I may have few rights in a Russian prison, but this is one I certainly intend to exercise.